What the convention comes down to
Skins are listed with two numbers, usually written together: a width in millimetres and a ski length in centimetres — 110/160, 125/190, 125/161–171. The first is the width of the strip before trimming, which must exceed the widest point of the ski it will cover. The second is the length range the strip will reach, tip to tail, once fitted.
Three forms share the shelf. A trim-to-fit skin comes oversize with a cutting tool and is shaped to the ski by its owner. A pre-cut skin arrives shaped for one named ski model and length. A universal strip is sold by width alone and needs both width and length trimmed.
The fitting at the ends is the third dimension nobody writes as a number. A tip loop is broadly universal; a tail clip has to match the notch in the ski’s tail, and a ski with no notch takes no clip.
What it does not promise
It does not promise grip. Fibre — mohair, nylon, a mix — decides grip and glide, and it is a separate line in the listing.
It does not promise the glue will hold. Adhesive type, renewability and cold behaviour are the maker’s claims, and they are what this shelf actually divides on.
It does not promise a tail fixing will fit. That is the most common surprise on this shelf, and a page here states what fixing a skin ships with rather than assuming the ski can take it.
It does not stay valid after cutting. A trimmed skin belongs to one ski, and its second-hand value is whatever somebody with that same ski will pay.
What it is read alongside
The ski dimensions convention supplies the two numbers a skin is bought against. The touring binding standard decides what the ski crampon does at the same point of the day. There is no document behind any of it.
Where it turns up on this site
Skins, and the touring ski shelf they are cut to. It touches the ski crampon shelf only in the sense that both are bought for the same climb.
This site handles it in one way, consistently. A skin page prints the width and the length range as published, states whether a cutting tool is included, names the tip and tail fixings, and reports the fibre and the adhesive as the maker describes them. Where a skin is pre-cut, the page names the ski it is pre-cut for, because that is the whole of the product.
The questions asked most often
Do I cut to the waist or to the tip?
Neither exactly. The strip is trimmed to follow the sidecut, leaving a millimetre or two of edge clear on each side, and the tool supplied with the skin is shaped to do it. Cutting to the tip width leaves a skin that drags in a track; cutting to the waist leaves the shovel bare.
What is a pre-cut skin?
A skin cut at the factory to one specific ski model and length. It saves the job and it fits nothing else, which makes it the least flexible purchase on this shelf.
Can a skin be recut for a new ski?
Only narrower and shorter. A skin that was trimmed for a 90 mm ski will not cover a 105 mm one, and length is the same story.
Last reviewed 28 September 2026